I have an announcement for everyone regarding our forums, as this will affect everyone so I felt the most notice possible was the only respectful way to handle this situation.

As many of you may, or may not know, the forums we are currently using are not part of the main A.A.A. Website. We are using a free-forum provider off of our server. I did this when we built the site for a number of reasons. Firstly, I didn’t know PhP script, the coding used to build forums, at the time. In my rush to get the initial website up, along with a working forum I didn’t invest time into studying PhP. I also didn’t know if the forms or the podcast in general would catch on.

But, things have obviously “caught on” and we’re still using forums off of our server.

So, we are going to be moving the forums onto the A.A.A. Website Server, but as I said before, this will affect all of you as it’s not a simple switch.

The Cons of Moving

The posts will be lost

This is the biggest problem with moving the forms. And I’ve wrestled with it for awhile. Because this free-forum site is looking out for itself, and its investors, they do not want people to leave or switch their forms. As a result there is no “export” button on this forum. The new forum will be a completely blank slate, everyone will have to re-register, and the posts here will not be there.

This forum will not be gone, but when the switch is made it will be locked down. So you can link back to this forum, just not post in it.

Chatbox

I know it’s something we just got, but I’m trying to be as honest as I can with you all. The new forum will not have the chatbox feature. I know most people are talking loosely in the chatbox and many are friends on skype anyways, but it will be lost.

The Pros of Moving

For the greater good of the A.A.A.

I hope this doesn’t sound selfish, but in the long term it will be better for the A.A.A. podcast. Website values are based on a number of things, but one of the things they’re based on is how long people spend on the site. As it stands now people don’t spend a lot of time on the main site – which we understand! But, moving the forums onto our server will help this aspect out. There are also google hits that are a factor. The number of times people visit a site the higher it rises on google. Having the forums part of our website and server will promote this also. The more hits the higher up we climb on google and the more benefits we can have available to us as a result.

Increasing the “value” of the site is not to sell it or to make profit; we did not go into this to make money. If we did we’d have the worst business sense out of anyone! But the “Value” of a site is more than bills, the more traffic a site has the more that site can offer to people and can draw people in.

The more we expand, the more options we have, which we can ultimately turn around and turn into benefits for you, the listener. And that is the true “value” of a website.

No Advertisements

Right now there’s that annoying ad bar right at the top of our forums. Since we will have the forums on our site we will not have those advertisements because at least for now we have nothing to advertise!

More stability/Greater control

If the forums are on our server, we have the ultimate control over them. Granted this is a very large and stable site that exists to offer forums, we are still limited in what we can do, and are at the mercy of the outside host. If we move the forums onto our server we have the ultimate control over them and in the off chance they won’t go down unless we know about it.

When will this move take Place?

This isn’t something we’re going to rush, first we’re going to put this out here for everyone to comment on and let us know how we can make this movement easier for all of you.

Following that I will announce two dates. The first date is when the new forums will go live and open; the Old forums (the current one) will still be open.

The second date will be when the old forum will be locked down. This forum will not be deleted, but it will be locked so that no new posts can be made anywhere. So like I said, you can link to it, but only the new forums will be available for posting.

This will occur over a period of about, if not more, a month.

Conclusion

I hope this all is clear and makes sense, I tried to be as transparent as possible. I want your honest opinions on the matter, and please let us know what we can do to make this transition easier. I hope I’ll never have to deliver a message like this ever again; it’s not exactly “fun” to do. We thought about this a lot, and felt the pros ultimately outweigh the cons and it will be best for everyone in the A.A.A. community in the long run.

We hope everyone will stick with us through this move, and that we can make it have the least negative effect as possible on our community.

Chiaki and the Hosts of the A.A.A.

_________________Can you hear it...?If you have truly not lost all hope,Then you can hear it, the sound that races through the revolution of the world!

Just wanted to follow up. I did a breakdown of the sites value based on traffic alone. According to www.mywebsiteworth.com, the forum is generating a traffic value that is 116x greater than the main page. Having this traffic pushed into the main page means greater positioning on Itunes as well as Google.

I think that it needs to be mentioned however that is is YOU guys that have become such good friends of ours on this forum that generated this potential. I think that's really great.

_________________

Make sure to take a stab at the trivia questions each week. You don't getpenalized for giving a wrong answer, but you might win a really great prize!Just send me, Mitsugi, a Private Message via the forum. Good Luck!!!------------------------------------------------------------------------------LONG LIVE, Great Teacher Onizuka!

how i see it as. it a much better than to move rather then stay on these forums. you guys get better benefits, that gives benefits to everyone else.

With the whole google thing with what mits said 116x more than the main page. That is a huge number which i rather see it benifit the web site as a whole rather than just a side page that has nothing to do with the forums.

We may lose our post, but however we can always repost and if need be we can always come back here copy and paste what we want.

The Chatbox is nice, but it's not a MUST. Having a more working web sites, that can gain everyone better Benefit is better than just a chat box.

the new forum will have more freedom for avatar selection in terms of dimensions and file size.

Enjoy! Doesn't freedom feel great?

_________________

Make sure to take a stab at the trivia questions each week. You don't getpenalized for giving a wrong answer, but you might win a really great prize!Just send me, Mitsugi, a Private Message via the forum. Good Luck!!!------------------------------------------------------------------------------LONG LIVE, Great Teacher Onizuka!

Hello everyone My name is Mikhail and i approve this message. Not that my Approval is needed but id thought id just throw it out there. Keep it up A.A.A. These forums have become a second home but home is where the people be and im sure this forum will survive a change of address.